WEBVTT - What's so great about Canada? (Spoiler: Lots of things!) 0:00:00.080 --> 0:00:03.080 Guess what, Mango? What's up? Will? So, the coldest temperature 0:00:03.120 --> 0:00:06.320 ever recorded in Canada was in a village called Snag. 0:00:06.360 --> 0:00:08.200 Have you ever heard of Snag? I've never heard of 0:00:08.240 --> 0:00:10.200 it before, but it's in the Yukon and it was 0:00:10.320 --> 0:00:14.080 negative sixty three degrees celsius. And this is about negative 0:00:14.160 --> 0:00:18.480 eight one degrees fahrenheit. It's crazy cold, but it's it's 0:00:18.480 --> 0:00:21.120 actually very close to the average temperature of the surface 0:00:21.200 --> 0:00:24.160 on Mars. But you know what else, what's that? As 0:00:24.200 --> 0:00:26.040 we'll explain in a minute, this is not what we're 0:00:26.040 --> 0:00:28.159 gonna be focused on in today's episode, on some of 0:00:28.200 --> 0:00:48.839 the most fascinating places in Canada. So let's get started. Hey, 0:00:48.880 --> 0:00:51.320 their podcast listeners, welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm Will 0:00:51.360 --> 0:00:53.520 Pearson and as always I'm joined by my good friend 0:00:53.520 --> 0:00:55.880 man gues Ticketer and the man on the other side 0:00:55.880 --> 0:00:58.840 of the soundproof glass sporting a jersey which he claims 0:00:58.920 --> 0:01:02.840 is signed by every single member of the nineteen Edmonton 0:01:02.960 --> 0:01:06.959 Oilers championship team is our friend and producer Tristan McNeil. 0:01:07.000 --> 0:01:09.760 That's pretty impressive if it's true. We have to fact 0:01:09.840 --> 0:01:12.200 check that. Now this is a show we've been planning 0:01:12.240 --> 0:01:14.480 to do for a little while now, because you know, 0:01:14.520 --> 0:01:16.640 a couple of months back, we made a comment about 0:01:16.680 --> 0:01:20.240 the average temperature in Canada and how cold it is there, 0:01:20.640 --> 0:01:23.080 and we heard from several Canadians about how it's not 0:01:23.200 --> 0:01:26.560 always cold and all of Canada, and you know, obviously 0:01:26.600 --> 0:01:29.280 it's a very big place, and and frankly, we've missed 0:01:29.280 --> 0:01:32.720 an opportunity to share some good facts about Canada. Now. 0:01:33.080 --> 0:01:35.320 We don't like the stereotype, at least I don't. I don't. 0:01:35.319 --> 0:01:38.640 You don't like the stereotype for me either, But but 0:01:38.720 --> 0:01:41.200 I have to say one thing about all these messages 0:01:41.240 --> 0:01:44.039 from the Canadians. They were some of the most polite 0:01:44.120 --> 0:01:47.640 letters of criticism I have ever read. It's true, and 0:01:47.640 --> 0:01:50.360 and not one but two of the letters included invitations 0:01:50.360 --> 0:01:53.160 to come visit Canada so we could experience it for ourselves. 0:01:53.240 --> 0:01:56.200 But again, we're not gonna stereotype here. I'm sure there's 0:01:56.240 --> 0:01:58.760 some real jerks in Canada. It's not any of them 0:01:58.800 --> 0:02:01.240 who wrote to us, you know, so, so in our 0:02:01.280 --> 0:02:04.120 replies we promised we would show Canada some love, and 0:02:04.480 --> 0:02:07.160 so that's what we're doing in today's episode. And do 0:02:07.200 --> 0:02:09.120 you want to tell them the exciting news yeah, I 0:02:09.120 --> 0:02:11.040 guess we should so. So, so this is just the 0:02:11.160 --> 0:02:14.720 first in a sixty five part series about Canada. Now 0:02:15.000 --> 0:02:17.360 we're not quite sure when the next sixty four parts 0:02:17.360 --> 0:02:19.919 will be but but we're pretty excited about it. So 0:02:20.000 --> 0:02:22.160 for today we we obviously won't be able to cover 0:02:22.320 --> 0:02:25.520 every fascinating thing about Canada, but we decided to each 0:02:25.520 --> 0:02:28.120 pick a few categories. And I know there were a 0:02:28.120 --> 0:02:30.520 few strange and fascinating places you wanted to talk about, 0:02:30.600 --> 0:02:34.120 and I of course claimed the animal category. But before 0:02:34.120 --> 0:02:36.200 we get to the various categories, I think we should 0:02:36.200 --> 0:02:39.080 probably start by acknowledging just how big a country Canada 0:02:39.160 --> 0:02:42.040 is and how diverse its landscape is. You want to 0:02:42.040 --> 0:02:44.600 give us a quick overview, Yeah, happy too. So so 0:02:44.880 --> 0:02:47.360 there were definitely some surprises for me in our research. 0:02:47.400 --> 0:02:49.400 But but just starting with the big facts, a couple 0:02:49.400 --> 0:02:51.720 of them that people may know, but just to make sure. So, 0:02:51.840 --> 0:02:54.520 Canada is the second largest country in the world in 0:02:54.639 --> 0:02:57.200 terms of land area. The biggest, of course, is Russia. 0:02:57.680 --> 0:03:00.400 It has the longest coastline of any country in the world, 0:03:00.480 --> 0:03:04.760 and it's the largest country that borders only one other country. Now, 0:03:04.760 --> 0:03:07.680 it has more freshwater than any country with get this, 0:03:08.080 --> 0:03:11.560 millions of lakes. That's right, millions of lakes. I had 0:03:11.560 --> 0:03:14.760 no idea. Yeah, so so, and actually, I'm not even 0:03:14.760 --> 0:03:17.399 done putting their freshwater dominance in perspective. Are you sure 0:03:17.440 --> 0:03:20.000 they're not puddles? Uh? You know, maybe there's a little 0:03:20.040 --> 0:03:22.280 language barrier here. We might have to check on that, 0:03:22.320 --> 0:03:25.040 but but still, I mean, millions, even millions of puddles 0:03:25.120 --> 0:03:27.560 is kind of impressive. But so but but this actually 0:03:27.600 --> 0:03:30.000 does put it in perspective. Here. It says one fifth 0:03:30.000 --> 0:03:33.120 of the world's freshwater is located in Canada. And and 0:03:33.160 --> 0:03:35.280 those millions of lakes, now we're talking maybe two to 0:03:35.360 --> 0:03:39.400 three million. That's more than all other countries lakes combined. 0:03:39.720 --> 0:03:43.440 So how do we not know this? Again, we're not stereotyping, 0:03:43.440 --> 0:03:45.160 but if we were, if we were going to just 0:03:45.200 --> 0:03:48.040 like dabble a little bit of stereotyping, we might say 0:03:48.040 --> 0:03:50.800 it's because they're too polite to brag about it. Yeah, 0:03:50.880 --> 0:03:53.000 I mean, that's something I'd definitely be bragging about. But 0:03:53.560 --> 0:03:55.520 I would have thought if they were bragging about anything, 0:03:55.520 --> 0:03:58.200 it would be about trees. Yeah, and there's definitely a 0:03:58.200 --> 0:04:01.000 ton of those. Two So Canada is home to nine 0:04:01.080 --> 0:04:03.880 percent of the world's forest. And I'm not sure if 0:04:03.880 --> 0:04:07.280 you knew this, but that's almost ten percent. Actually, wait here, 0:04:07.320 --> 0:04:10.360 here is one source. This is from a Reader's Digest 0:04:10.440 --> 0:04:13.120 Canadian addition that claims they do have ten percent of 0:04:13.160 --> 0:04:16.080 the world's forest. And this is definitely the Canadian addition 0:04:16.120 --> 0:04:18.480 because they spell favorite with a U in it, and 0:04:18.520 --> 0:04:20.640 they might be a little bit bias, but I'm going 0:04:20.680 --> 0:04:23.240 with it. Well, I support that, And didn't I read 0:04:23.240 --> 0:04:25.599 that the huge percentage of that forest land is actually 0:04:25.600 --> 0:04:28.839 publicly owned. Yeah, that's right, and in fact, almost all 0:04:28.880 --> 0:04:32.640 of it. It's something like of the forest landed Canada 0:04:32.800 --> 0:04:35.279 is owned by the government and and for that reason, 0:04:35.279 --> 0:04:38.440 it's often referred to as crown land, and that is 0:04:38.480 --> 0:04:40.920 belonging to the monarch. Now, at some point in our 0:04:40.920 --> 0:04:44.279 sixty five part series, we'll talk about the relationship between 0:04:44.320 --> 0:04:47.240 the monarch and Canada. It's all kind of strange and confusing, 0:04:47.279 --> 0:04:50.440 but that's for another episode. But a decent number of 0:04:50.440 --> 0:04:53.440 these forests are part of national parks. And I'm gonna 0:04:53.480 --> 0:04:56.000 go back to this Reader's Digest Canada article because it's 0:04:56.040 --> 0:04:59.360 the one place I've seen the Canadian do some serious bragging. 0:04:59.400 --> 0:05:01.719 And the guy that wrote his name is Daniel Reid, 0:05:01.760 --> 0:05:04.680 and he says Canada is so big that even our 0:05:04.839 --> 0:05:08.040 parks are bigger than countries. Well, I feel like they 0:05:08.080 --> 0:05:10.840 need a marketing campaign with Canada's so big jokes man, 0:05:10.839 --> 0:05:13.520 this would be the best, need a whole book of so. 0:05:13.520 --> 0:05:16.360 So read points out that Nahini National Park Reserve in 0:05:16.400 --> 0:05:20.520 the Northwest Territories is not only incredible because if its waterfalls, 0:05:20.520 --> 0:05:23.520 but it's actually so big. It's bigger than countries like 0:05:23.600 --> 0:05:27.480 Albania and Israel. And and this is a single national 0:05:27.560 --> 0:05:29.800 park and it's not even the biggest. There's another one 0:05:29.800 --> 0:05:33.280 Wood Buffalo National Park in Alberta and the Northwest Territories. 0:05:33.640 --> 0:05:36.680 It's even bigger. In fact, it's bigger than Denmark and 0:05:36.839 --> 0:05:40.479 Switzerland's incredible. That is incredible. So do you have anything 0:05:40.480 --> 0:05:42.600 else to show just how big Canada is? Yeah, I've 0:05:42.600 --> 0:05:45.120 actually got one more. And so so, Canada's home to 0:05:45.240 --> 0:05:48.000 about a quarter of the world's wetlands. And this is 0:05:48.000 --> 0:05:50.719 another one that that surprised me. So we're talking over 0:05:50.760 --> 0:05:54.920 a million square kilometers of wetlands. And according to Canadian 0:05:54.960 --> 0:05:59.000 Geographic quote, these wetlands helped moderate river flows and cleans 0:05:59.040 --> 0:06:02.600 polluted water and support a complex web of species, from 0:06:02.680 --> 0:06:06.920 microscopic zill plankton to migratory sea birds to large mammals 0:06:06.960 --> 0:06:11.040 like moose and caribou. They also store massive amounts of 0:06:11.080 --> 0:06:15.080 carbon now, particularly the boreal peatlands, and at a minimum, 0:06:15.120 --> 0:06:18.480 the peatland store a hundred and forty seven billion tons 0:06:18.520 --> 0:06:21.359 of carbons. This is the equivalent to seven hundred and 0:06:21.400 --> 0:06:25.599 thirty six years worth of Canada's industrial greenhouse gas emissions. 0:06:25.839 --> 0:06:28.760 So it's definitely in Canada's best interest to see those 0:06:28.839 --> 0:06:32.360 areas protected. Yeah, so, once again something I did not know. 0:06:32.520 --> 0:06:35.039 But speaking of all the interesting species, can I actually 0:06:35.080 --> 0:06:37.640 talk about one of the categories we mentioned earlier? Animals 0:06:37.680 --> 0:06:39.599 because it just seems like the right time. Yeah, it 0:06:39.640 --> 0:06:42.040 definitely does, all right, go for it. Well, it's definitely 0:06:42.040 --> 0:06:44.480 no easy task to decide on which ones to talk about, 0:06:44.520 --> 0:06:47.200 because there are obviously a ton of interesting animals in Canada. 0:06:47.560 --> 0:06:49.840 And I don't know if you've heard, but Canada is 0:06:49.880 --> 0:06:52.039 a big place. I feel like I have heard that. 0:06:52.440 --> 0:06:54.599 But I decided to focus on three that I really 0:06:54.600 --> 0:06:56.280 want to go see at some point, and I'm going 0:06:56.320 --> 0:06:58.719 to start with another thing that Canada is the king of, 0:06:59.240 --> 0:07:02.120 and that's pull slar bears. Well this, I hope this 0:07:02.200 --> 0:07:05.360 is impressive as my ten per cent of the world. Fact, actually, 0:07:05.400 --> 0:07:08.520 it's even better because two thirds of the world's polar 0:07:08.520 --> 0:07:11.400 bears are in Canada. No way, that's crazy. So we're 0:07:11.400 --> 0:07:15.760 talking about roughly sixteen thousand polar bears and Churchill, Manitoba 0:07:15.880 --> 0:07:17.720 is known as the polar bear capital of the world. 0:07:18.120 --> 0:07:20.040 It's a it's a pretty big claim. So why why 0:07:20.120 --> 0:07:21.720 is that? I mean, maybe that's a dumb question. I'm 0:07:21.760 --> 0:07:24.360 guessing there are a bunch of polar bears there. Yeah, well, 0:07:24.480 --> 0:07:26.320 at least for part of the year, and that's because 0:07:26.320 --> 0:07:29.400 it's on the western shore of the Hudson Bay where 0:07:29.440 --> 0:07:32.280 they gather each year to hunt seals once the bay freezes, 0:07:32.320 --> 0:07:35.000 and you'll find thousands of tourists visiting Churchill each year 0:07:35.040 --> 0:07:38.080 to see these massive bears in their natural habitat. This 0:07:38.160 --> 0:07:40.720 is in a really remote town with no real roads 0:07:40.760 --> 0:07:42.320 going to it, and you can only get there by 0:07:42.360 --> 0:07:46.360 plane or the Winnipeg Churchill rail line. Only about people 0:07:46.400 --> 0:07:48.880 actually live in the town. But you're talking about this town, 0:07:48.880 --> 0:07:52.040 so the polar bears actually come into the town itself. Yeah, 0:07:52.240 --> 0:07:54.720 it's actually becoming a little bit of a problem because 0:07:54.720 --> 0:07:57.200 of warming temperatures, which make it harder for polar bears 0:07:57.200 --> 0:07:59.600 to hunt seals, you know, due to less ice cover. 0:08:00.000 --> 0:08:02.280 More bears have been venturing in town in recent years, 0:08:02.280 --> 0:08:04.920 and about five of the bears are pretty close to 0:08:04.960 --> 0:08:07.520 the town. Wow, So is I mean, is there anything 0:08:07.560 --> 0:08:10.760 they can do about this? So obviously global warming and 0:08:10.920 --> 0:08:13.720 roaming bears in your town aren't that funny. But I 0:08:13.800 --> 0:08:15.800 have to admit it's kind of funny to read about 0:08:15.800 --> 0:08:18.240 one of their solutions, and that's the fact that they 0:08:18.240 --> 0:08:22.200 have these polar bear jails there. Really. Yeah, so residents 0:08:22.200 --> 0:08:24.360 can call a twenty four hour hotline when they see 0:08:24.360 --> 0:08:26.960 a bear wandering around town, and any bear that they 0:08:27.000 --> 0:08:30.280 can't successfully scare off is then captured and taken to 0:08:30.320 --> 0:08:33.680 this polar bear holding facility. It's held there until it 0:08:33.720 --> 0:08:36.079 can be airlifted north and return to the wild. And 0:08:36.360 --> 0:08:39.040 last year, fifty three bears spent some time in the Slammer. 0:08:39.600 --> 0:08:42.640 It's crazy. So there's a twenty four hour hot line 0:08:42.640 --> 0:08:44.880 about this that that that sounds almost as important as 0:08:44.880 --> 0:08:48.319 our twenty four hour hotline, I guess. Actually for the record, listeners, 0:08:48.360 --> 0:08:50.200 if you want to call and tell us about your 0:08:50.280 --> 0:08:53.439 bear sightings. In addition to some great facts, you can 0:08:53.520 --> 0:08:56.560 also leave us a message on our seven fact hot 0:08:56.600 --> 0:08:59.800 line one eight four four pt genius. So so so 0:09:00.000 --> 0:09:03.440 that they built this jail for the bears originally, well 0:09:03.640 --> 0:09:06.599 it was originally this military aircraft hanger, but there was 0:09:06.640 --> 0:09:09.840 converted into this polar bear holding facility in n and 0:09:10.240 --> 0:09:14.720 since opening, it's actually held over two thousand polar bears. Wow, 0:09:14.800 --> 0:09:16.920 that does seem like a really cool thing to see. 0:09:16.920 --> 0:09:19.079 And and even the travel by train there, like you 0:09:19.160 --> 0:09:21.800 mentioned that that probably takes a while to get there, 0:09:21.840 --> 0:09:25.160 but it seems like it makes the experience that much cooler. Alright, So, 0:09:25.160 --> 0:09:27.400 so what you got next? Alright, so that this one 0:09:27.520 --> 0:09:29.880 is very different. We're gonna go from the largest gathering 0:09:29.920 --> 0:09:33.000 of polar bears to possibly the largest gathering of snakes 0:09:33.000 --> 0:09:36.559 in the world. I'm talking about the snake dens in Manitoba, 0:09:36.640 --> 0:09:40.040 where tens of thousands of red gardeners snakes congregate to 0:09:40.040 --> 0:09:43.280 do their mating thing after spending all winter in their dens. 0:09:43.320 --> 0:09:46.040 This crazy ritual happens for a few weeks in late 0:09:46.080 --> 0:09:48.800 April or early May, depending on the weather. The mails 0:09:48.840 --> 0:09:51.160 come out first and just wait on the females. And 0:09:51.240 --> 0:09:53.520 here's how it was described in an article by Joanna 0:09:53.559 --> 0:09:56.679 Klein in the New York Times last year. Quote, in 0:09:56.760 --> 0:09:59.320 this sea of snakes, a female isn't easy to find, 0:09:59.400 --> 0:10:02.440 even though she three or four times bigger. At times, 0:10:02.480 --> 0:10:06.280 the ratio of males to females is ten to one. Yeah, 0:10:06.320 --> 0:10:10.360 So a female secretes pheromones from her skin, luring dozens 0:10:10.400 --> 0:10:13.160 to hundreds of males that try to quarter by rubbing 0:10:13.200 --> 0:10:16.480 their chins along her back and flicking their tongues. She 0:10:16.640 --> 0:10:19.439 ultimately decides when she's ready to mate by a mysterious 0:10:19.480 --> 0:10:24.640 mechanism called cryptic female choice, and the closest male wins 0:10:24.679 --> 0:10:27.520 and leaves a stinky plug insider that tells others to 0:10:27.559 --> 0:10:29.560 back off. She can wait a couple of days for 0:10:29.559 --> 0:10:32.240 the plug to dissolve and mate with another snake, or 0:10:32.320 --> 0:10:34.520 she can slither off into the swamps to feed and 0:10:34.559 --> 0:10:38.280 give live births to her babies. In August ten thousand 0:10:38.320 --> 0:10:42.240 to one. I mean, that is crazy, That is pretty intense. 0:10:42.280 --> 0:10:44.240 But but I can imagine it'd be tough for a 0:10:44.280 --> 0:10:46.760 lot of people to watch this, even if people think 0:10:46.800 --> 0:10:48.839 they want to go watch this. But I don't know. 0:10:48.840 --> 0:10:50.720 I'm gonna act off and pretend that I'm not one 0:10:50.720 --> 0:10:53.000 of those people. So I want to go see this place. Okay, 0:10:53.000 --> 0:10:54.880 So I've got one more on the animal front, and 0:10:54.920 --> 0:10:57.439 this one's pretty simple. One of these days, I want 0:10:57.440 --> 0:10:59.520 to get up to the Wood Buffalo National Park that 0:10:59.559 --> 0:11:02.439 you mentioned earlier. It's in Alberta, and it's home to 0:11:02.520 --> 0:11:05.880 the world's largest beaver dam, which is so big. It 0:11:05.960 --> 0:11:08.800 was first spotted by his satellite photos about a decade ago, 0:11:09.240 --> 0:11:12.880 and it's over eight hundred fifty meters long. That's huge. 0:11:13.240 --> 0:11:15.120 I do have to admit all this metric system talk 0:11:15.240 --> 0:11:17.720 is making me a little bit dizzy. But but I 0:11:17.760 --> 0:11:19.800 want to see this thing too. And and these are 0:11:19.840 --> 0:11:23.920 some awesome animals, Maga. So you've talked about polar bears, snakes, 0:11:24.440 --> 0:11:26.440 and the beaver dam. I want to see all of 0:11:26.480 --> 0:11:29.319 these things. Now I'm ready to jump with my own list. 0:11:29.320 --> 0:11:42.160 But first let's take a quick break to Mango. Today, 0:11:42.200 --> 0:11:45.320 we've got an incredibly special guest on the program, asked 0:11:45.320 --> 0:11:48.280 for not Chris Hadfield. Now, now Chris has had so 0:11:48.320 --> 0:11:51.679 many incredible things on his resume that it's honestly kind 0:11:51.679 --> 0:11:54.600 of hard to know how to introduce him. He's taken 0:11:54.640 --> 0:11:57.520 three trips into space. He's the first Canadian to walk 0:11:57.559 --> 0:12:01.360 in space, first Canadian commander of the International Space Station. 0:12:01.920 --> 0:12:05.560 And if you somehow missed his incredible YouTube videos from space, 0:12:06.080 --> 0:12:08.400 you definitely should pause this and go watch his ted 0:12:08.440 --> 0:12:12.000 talk about going blind in space and then everything else 0:12:12.040 --> 0:12:15.200 from there, because it's all so wonderful. But Chris, welcome 0:12:15.240 --> 0:12:18.240 to part time genius. It is my pleasure to be 0:12:18.320 --> 0:12:21.920 joining YouTube. Gents, thanks very much. So we know you've 0:12:21.920 --> 0:12:24.880 had a ton of incredible adventures, including things like escorting 0:12:25.200 --> 0:12:27.920 Soviet bombers out of Canadian airspace and living in a 0:12:27.920 --> 0:12:30.560 research vessel in the bottom of the ocean. But as 0:12:30.600 --> 0:12:33.200 a kid growing up in Canada, knowing you wanted to 0:12:33.240 --> 0:12:35.680 get to space, how do you figure out that career 0:12:35.800 --> 0:12:39.040 roadmap to you know, get to space three times? Gosh? 0:12:39.080 --> 0:12:41.559 There there there was no roadmap at the time for 0:12:41.600 --> 0:12:45.160 a Canadian um. We didn't have a space agency. We 0:12:45.200 --> 0:12:48.920 had one satellite up called Elouette, which was looking at 0:12:48.920 --> 0:12:52.840 the ionosphere in northern lights, but there were no Canadian 0:12:53.000 --> 0:12:55.040 I mean at the time, I chose the only astronauts 0:12:55.040 --> 0:12:57.520 in the world where the Soviets with Euryga garn and 0:12:57.880 --> 0:13:00.640 Alecta leon Us and then the Americans with John Glenn 0:13:00.640 --> 0:13:03.680 and Al Sheppard and company. So, you know, I said, 0:13:03.679 --> 0:13:05.800 do I become a Soviet? Do I become an American? 0:13:05.920 --> 0:13:08.720 What you know, what do you do? And so I 0:13:09.000 --> 0:13:11.320 it's like a roadmap with no map and no roads. 0:13:11.520 --> 0:13:15.320 But I just reminded myself, even as a nine year old, 0:13:15.320 --> 0:13:21.680 that for Yuri Gagarin and and Neil Armstrong, astronauts didn't 0:13:21.720 --> 0:13:24.480 even exist when those guys were born, and yet somehow 0:13:24.559 --> 0:13:28.440 they had, they had turned themselves into somebody who could 0:13:28.440 --> 0:13:31.440 be trusted to fly a spaceship. And I figured, that's 0:13:31.480 --> 0:13:33.440 the map I'm going to follow. I'm gonna try and 0:13:33.480 --> 0:13:36.920 just change who I am into someone who someday may 0:13:36.960 --> 0:13:39.480 hand me the keys to a spaceship. And and amazingly 0:13:39.559 --> 0:13:42.319 enough that happened, and as you say, I flew in 0:13:42.400 --> 0:13:46.280 space three times and ended up commanding the International Space Station. 0:13:46.559 --> 0:13:48.240 You know, one of my favorite parts of your videos 0:13:48.240 --> 0:13:50.960 was seeing you do these mundane things in space, like 0:13:51.400 --> 0:13:53.720 you know, brushing your teeth and how it really isn't 0:13:53.800 --> 0:13:56.920 that different, but but clipping your toenails is completely different. 0:13:56.960 --> 0:13:59.319 I mean, what do you think is the hardest common 0:13:59.360 --> 0:14:02.880 thing to a just two when you're in space. Yeah, 0:14:02.920 --> 0:14:06.120 some of the mundane stuff is so hard up there, 0:14:06.200 --> 0:14:08.320 and some things that are hard on Earth just become 0:14:08.360 --> 0:14:11.240 dead easy. Like of course you can fly around, not 0:14:11.320 --> 0:14:15.400 even fly. You can move around the spaceship as if 0:14:15.440 --> 0:14:19.360 you had a superpower, as if you were I don't know, 0:14:19.440 --> 0:14:22.280 one of the X men. You can just magically move 0:14:22.360 --> 0:14:25.080 with no effort, and and that's different than being on Earth. 0:14:25.360 --> 0:14:28.840 But we have to exercise to keep her body strong 0:14:28.920 --> 0:14:31.400 up there, and in order to use some of the 0:14:31.520 --> 0:14:34.040 exercise equipment, it's best to wear running shoes, like if 0:14:34.080 --> 0:14:37.600 you're if you're using the resistive exercise equipment, you want 0:14:37.600 --> 0:14:40.160 the foot support. Trying to put on a pair of 0:14:40.240 --> 0:14:43.280 running shoes is really hard without gravity. It doesn't seem 0:14:43.360 --> 0:14:45.160 like it would be, but if you think about it, 0:14:45.720 --> 0:14:48.440 none of you put your shoes on while balancing on 0:14:48.440 --> 0:14:51.560 one foot. You always sort of plumped down, and then 0:14:51.600 --> 0:14:54.400 you have the stability of gravity holding your butt still. 0:14:54.560 --> 0:14:56.680 And then you have because you have two hands and 0:14:56.760 --> 0:14:59.960 one foot busy, well, if you're waitless, as soon as 0:15:00.000 --> 0:15:02.920 you tie up both hands and one foot, basically there's 0:15:02.920 --> 0:15:05.880 nothing to hold you in place anymore. You can't still 0:15:05.960 --> 0:15:09.000 with the toes of one foot, And every every single 0:15:09.040 --> 0:15:12.000 time I would, I would float one shoe next to 0:15:12.000 --> 0:15:14.480 me in weightlessness, and then I would get busy, sort 0:15:14.480 --> 0:15:17.640 of gently tumbling around doing up the one shoe. But 0:15:17.680 --> 0:15:20.200 every single time, by the time I turned around, I 0:15:20.280 --> 0:15:22.600 had rotated to some whole new orientation and the other 0:15:22.600 --> 0:15:26.720 shoe was gone every time. So so so, yeah, it's 0:15:26.840 --> 0:15:30.400 the simple stuff becomes suddenly hard and some of the 0:15:30.440 --> 0:15:35.080 real hard things become easy. That's amazing. Um. So, one 0:15:35.080 --> 0:15:37.200 of the things I feel like I heard you say 0:15:37.400 --> 0:15:39.400 was that when you were traveling in the space, that 0:15:39.480 --> 0:15:43.680 there were sunsets of sunrises every minutes. But I was curious, 0:15:43.720 --> 0:15:46.200 what's the most spectacular parts of Earth that you remember 0:15:46.200 --> 0:15:49.520 seeing from space? Yeah, you go around the world in 0:15:49.600 --> 0:15:52.600 ninety two minutes, so depending on the angle between you 0:15:52.680 --> 0:15:56.080 the Earth and the sun, um, it might be crisply 0:15:56.160 --> 0:15:58.640 every forty six minutes you get a sunrise, or or 0:15:58.680 --> 0:16:00.280 you may be on sort of the oblique and then 0:16:00.280 --> 0:16:03.520 you get along a longer, slower diagonal version of it. 0:16:04.120 --> 0:16:07.640 But um, you know, one of the most beautiful things 0:16:07.680 --> 0:16:11.040 I ever saw was something that you can hardly ever 0:16:11.160 --> 0:16:14.000 see from Earth. And even hardly ever see from the spaceship, 0:16:14.320 --> 0:16:18.480 and that is these ethereal super high altitude clouds that 0:16:18.520 --> 0:16:21.800 are way up in the thermosphere where it's just very 0:16:21.920 --> 0:16:24.800 very few ice crystals, way way up above the Earth, 0:16:24.880 --> 0:16:28.000 almost up to the altitude of the spaceship. And if 0:16:28.040 --> 0:16:30.520 you get your angle just right where the sun is 0:16:30.560 --> 0:16:32.640 still on the other side of the world, but the 0:16:32.720 --> 0:16:36.720 sunrise rays are just touching the upper part of the atmosphere, 0:16:37.200 --> 0:16:41.040 suddenly it looks like the Earth is encased in like 0:16:41.040 --> 0:16:46.800 like a ghost surf. There's this this blue rolling curves 0:16:46.840 --> 0:16:50.360 of waves way up around the world, and and it's 0:16:50.880 --> 0:16:53.880 unbelievable to look at. We call them not to loosen clouds, 0:16:54.000 --> 0:16:56.280 not to loosen like glowing in the dark clouds. But 0:16:56.920 --> 0:16:59.000 I only saw them for a couple of minutes total 0:16:59.120 --> 0:17:01.840 in in my three space flights. And I grabbed the 0:17:01.880 --> 0:17:03.680 camera and I was thinking, no way, any of these 0:17:03.680 --> 0:17:05.520 pictures are going to turn out, but this is too 0:17:05.640 --> 0:17:08.159 rare to miss. And I took a whole bunch of 0:17:08.200 --> 0:17:12.360 pictures of them and just just staggered by the by 0:17:12.400 --> 0:17:17.199 the transient, um delicate beauty of it. But um, the 0:17:17.240 --> 0:17:19.960 pictures did turn out and In fact, they're pretty scientifically 0:17:19.960 --> 0:17:22.600 interesting because it teaches us about the upper reaches of 0:17:22.640 --> 0:17:26.120 the atmosphere and also about the status of the climate 0:17:26.160 --> 0:17:30.640 itself because it's one more way to measure changes in 0:17:30.640 --> 0:17:34.679 in gaseous and water content and the atmosphere. So a 0:17:34.720 --> 0:17:38.680 beautiful thing but also kind of a technically interesting thing 0:17:39.280 --> 0:17:41.240 and something the only moment I've seen it in my 0:17:41.240 --> 0:17:46.160 whole life. Wow. Now, now, now speaking of sight or 0:17:46.240 --> 0:17:48.080 or lack of you know, I know you talk about 0:17:48.160 --> 0:17:51.040 in your Ted talk going blind in space, but but 0:17:51.080 --> 0:17:55.320 could you just touch on that experience here. Sure, I've 0:17:55.359 --> 0:17:58.760 done two spacewalks where you put on the big white 0:17:59.400 --> 0:18:03.320 suits and go outside the spaceship and we call it 0:18:03.359 --> 0:18:05.960 a suit, like a space walking suit or an outfit. 0:18:06.040 --> 0:18:09.520 But but in truth, um, that space suit is really 0:18:09.560 --> 0:18:12.760 just a one person spaceship, is what it is. It's 0:18:12.760 --> 0:18:17.080 a completely self contained little spaceship. It even has a 0:18:17.160 --> 0:18:19.080 jet pack on it. It's got its own thrust or 0:18:19.119 --> 0:18:22.359 system on it. And since it's uh, you know, the 0:18:22.400 --> 0:18:24.600 only thing you're attached to the space station with is 0:18:24.640 --> 0:18:27.520 like a little metal clothesline just to teach from floating away. 0:18:28.080 --> 0:18:31.680 So um, that system it has to purify its own 0:18:31.720 --> 0:18:36.520 air has to have an oxygen supply, power, cooling, radio, everything, 0:18:37.240 --> 0:18:40.639 and mine had some contamination in it that we weren't expecting. 0:18:41.040 --> 0:18:45.520 And on the way the contamination, let let itself be known, 0:18:46.160 --> 0:18:49.080 was it got in my left eye. And you can't 0:18:49.119 --> 0:18:51.439 touch your face, of course, you're inside a big helmet. 0:18:52.000 --> 0:18:59.040 So I suddenly had some nasty, really aggravating UM stuff 0:18:59.080 --> 0:19:01.400 in my eye. And eye does what and E does 0:19:01.480 --> 0:19:03.880 you know? It's slam shut. It hurt and it started 0:19:03.880 --> 0:19:06.840 tearing up, and I couldn't do anything about it. But 0:19:07.400 --> 0:19:10.719 because there's no gravity, the tears don't go anywhere, they 0:19:10.720 --> 0:19:13.120 don't fall, they don't drain down your face like they're 0:19:13.119 --> 0:19:15.879 supposed to. They just sit there as a ball of 0:19:15.920 --> 0:19:20.520 contaminated liquid getting slightly ever bigger on your eye. And 0:19:20.600 --> 0:19:23.680 the unfortunate consequence of that is, as soon as that 0:19:23.760 --> 0:19:28.119 ball of contaminated tear it's big enough, it crosses the 0:19:28.160 --> 0:19:30.320 bridge of your nose into your other eye, sort of 0:19:30.640 --> 0:19:34.119 against my my will and out of my control, And 0:19:34.160 --> 0:19:37.800 so then I was blinded in both eyes. And then 0:19:37.840 --> 0:19:39.639 it's a matter of how do you react? You know, 0:19:39.680 --> 0:19:44.960 you're outside the spaceship holding on um whereas sight is 0:19:45.000 --> 0:19:48.439 really important for safety, and now suddenly you're struck blind, 0:19:49.280 --> 0:19:51.919 uh or at least as blind. Imagine if you were 0:19:52.000 --> 0:19:55.159 lying in your back and someone just kept dripping a 0:19:55.240 --> 0:19:58.679 really harsh shampoo into your eyes so that every you know, 0:19:58.720 --> 0:20:00.679 you just couldn't hold your eyes o, but everything was 0:20:00.720 --> 0:20:02.920 all blurred and your eyeballs hurt when you opened them. 0:20:03.080 --> 0:20:07.520 That's what I felt like. So I talked to Houston 0:20:07.600 --> 0:20:12.280 and and I was outside with one other astronaut, a 0:20:12.280 --> 0:20:16.200 guy named Scott Parazynski, and we talked about it. Of course, 0:20:16.280 --> 0:20:20.240 we've practiced one of us being incapacitated. You know, it's 0:20:20.280 --> 0:20:22.840 not like something that could never happen. We even had 0:20:22.920 --> 0:20:27.040 procedures for incapacitated crew rescues. So we don't want to 0:20:27.080 --> 0:20:29.600 do that because that means the whole spacewalk is stopped, 0:20:29.680 --> 0:20:32.119 and you're not going to get to all the work done, 0:20:32.119 --> 0:20:34.080 and there's going to be all sorts of people are 0:20:34.119 --> 0:20:38.160 going to be all excited about it. But m Fortunately, 0:20:39.440 --> 0:20:42.080 I had worked in mission control for twenty five Shuttle flights. 0:20:42.080 --> 0:20:44.760 I knew everybody there. They trusted me. We talked about it, 0:20:45.040 --> 0:20:48.800